Mumbai, India needs to embrace and harness wireless communication technologies to become the most developed nation in the coming decades, Telecom Secretary J.S. Deepak said on Tuesday.

“Whether India grows at normal pace or it actually leapfrogs to become one of the most developed nation in coming decades, will inter-alia depend on how we embrace and harness wireless communication technologies,” he said at at the inaugural session of a public outreach and awareness programme on electromagnetic field (EMF) emissions and mobile towers organised here under the DoT’s aegis.

Stressing telecom towers are critical installations on which the backbone of wireless communication rests, he said that unfounded apprehensions around EMF emissions and mobile towers have the potential to derail the country’s growth story.

Deepak also said that there is no scientific evidence backing the claim that EMF radiation from mobile towers – which are below the safe limits prescribed by the International Commission on Non-ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) and recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) – can cause adverse health effects.

The DoT has already prescribed strict precautionary norms for exposure limit for the radio frequency field (base station emissions) which is 10 times more stringent than the existing limits prescribed by ICNIRP and recommended by WHO.

“Our EMF norms are much stricter than what is followed by many developed nations, including the US, the UK and most parts of the European Union. Further, the government of India has taken adequate steps to ensure that telecommunications service providers strictly adhere to these prescribed norms,” he added.